In Nayru's Palm
by starfiresky
Summary: Zelda's point of view through the Ocarina of Time story.
1. Chapter 1: After the Flight

"Zelda...Zelda, wake up."

I groaned, my body stiff from lying on the ground. Callused hands shook at my shoulders, which were still covered by the gown I had worn the day before. When the hand didn't stop shaking me, I sat up, rubbing my eyes and immediately wishing I hadn't. My hands were covered in dust, and my eyes instantly began to itch.

"Highness, here," whispered Impa gently, and I felt something press against my right hand. When I groped at it, I felt a bowl just as it tilted from impact and poured most of its contents on my lap. My caretaker sighed, then took my hands in one of hers and led them to the bowl she had set down with her other hand. Deftly she rubbed the grit off my hands with her thumbs, then wiped at my face. Hesitantly I cracked open one of my eyelids to look at her. Her silver eyelashes were close together, as were her eyebrows, as she searched for any more traces of grime in my face. When she noticed I had opened my eyes, she gave me a strained smile.

"There you go, Zelda," she said softly, getting to her feet in one fluid motion. I watched her move to a puddle further into the cave we had dropped into the night before, when we had been chased out of my home—our home—by the Gerudo king. When the memory imposed itself on the forefront of my mind, I shuddered, remembering the fear, the faces…I had seen too many people killed yesterday. Soldiers, civilians…My people. So many dead now.

Impa's return to her feet brought me out of those memories, though I was still seeing crimson flashes every time I blinked. She walked across the cave and knelt in front of a stone that reminded me uncomfortably of a grave marker, but the design was familiar. Whenever I tried to look at it, I got a strange feeling in my head, and I felt like I was being watched, like my soul was under scrutiny.

"Come here, Zelda."

I got up and walked over to her. I knelt, trying my hardest not to step on my skirt, but feeling like it was wasted effort. At this proximity, the stone was in clear view, and when I met the eyelike design on its surface, it seemed like a needle was prodding me between the eyes, all the way back to the other side of my skull. When I crushed my eyelids closed, a finger pressed itself to my forehead.

"I apologize, Zelda," said Impa, her voice guilty. The pain in my head disappeared. "Now it should recognize you."

When I brought my eyes back to the stone, it was still disconcerting, but this time I got the feeling that it was pulling me in, rather than trying to repel me. It still gave me a headache.

"I don't like this stone, Impa."

She ignored me. "I need you to look into the eye, Zelda."

"I am—"

"I mean _really_ look into it, Highness."

I glanced at her, unsure of what she was asking, but Impa had never wished me harm before. Steeling myself, I looked into the eye.

Images flashed before my eyes like flickers of color, but when I began to try to sort it all out, some of them stood out.

…soldiers limped up a hill, some of them battered beyond recognition, some eyes rolling…

…horses stood at varying intervals in a pasture, every head up with ears up, each looking frazzled and startled, sweat coating their flanks and shoulders and chests…

…strange, one-eyed monsters with heads that rotated on their shoulders stood beneath what seemed to be a giant draconic skull…

…a Gerudo woman and a cow stood at a distance, between a canyon wall and a large river…

…a young boy in green ran up a set of stairs onto a small lawn…

…he stood and stared up at something out of the sight of the viewer…

…hesitating, he walked to the right—his left—and…

…slowly disappeared from view…

_No_, I thought desperately, wishing that he would come back within my eyesight as I watched red tektites jump each other, fighting furiously with serrated legs on a rocky mountain trail. The boy in green, Link, was integral. He may only be about my age—about ten, but he may have been younger—but he had been prophesied to be the one to save Hyrule. I should know. I made the prophecy.

I had had a dream where dark, malevolent clouds had billowed over the land, but a ray of light from the forest had parted the clouds and lit everything up, including a boy in green followed by a fairy and holding the Spiritual Stone of the Forest. Very few days had gone by before the boy himself had shown up in my courtyard, fairy flitting behind him and the stone in his pocket. Not to mention the sword and shield strapped to his back. That meeting, I had told him all of what was going on in my castle. I told him of the legend of the three goddesses, Din, Farore, and Nayru, and how the triangle would react to different people. If a good person touched it, found the Sacred Realm, Hyrule would be a paradise. If someone evil got ahold of the relic, Hyrule would be a place of evil. I also told him about how to get to the triangle with the three spiritual stones and the Ocarina of Time, through the Temple of Time.

I then showed him, through our window, the Gerudo prince Ganondorf coming into our audience chamber swearing allegiance to my father. An allegiance that he had proved insincere last night, I thought bitterly. He truly was the dark clouds embodied. Ganondorf had killed my father, the king, and tried to get me, and get the Ocarina of Time. He killed the Sheikah that had been reporting to Impa with Link's whereabouts and his progress. If it had not been for Impa, he would probably have killed me and gotten the Ocarina.

And he still thought I had it, but I had thrown it to Link as we had gone past, just out of the castle walls. I was glad that I had seen him safe since then, for I had no idea what Ganondorf had done to him; all I had known that night was that Ganondorf had suddenly stopped chasing us for a brief span of Time right after we had seen Link.

I was just glad he was okay.


	2. Chapter 2: The Stone

I smiled and pulled away from the creepy stone.

"He is going to be the Hero of Time, is he not?" I asked Impa. Her brows knit together.

"It is possible," she allowed reluctantly. "There is no way to really know, Highness."

Didn't she understand? I had prophesized Link's saving Hyrule. How better than as the Hero of Time?

"I'll go get you something to eat," Impa said wearily, rising smoothly to her feet and going back to the entrance. I turned away from her as she left, and glared at the stone. It stared right back, giving me a sudden, piercing headache and making me break eye contact. Go figure that the Sheikah would make a rock that could win a staring contest.

I got up and walked around the cave. The sand whispered under my shod feet. I had never seen sand before, until last night. I hadn't really spared any real thought to it, either. Dropping to my knees, I ran it through my fingers, marveling at how it would sieve itself through my fingers like water. It was a deep grey, and even as I poured it from my hand, some still clung to my palm like a protective coat. Fascinated, I got up and looked for more things. Finding one in the far corner, I got to my feet again and, tripping once over my skirt, I looked up at a brown something. It was pockmarked with many holes, and looked like it was made from something similar to paper.

"Don't touch that, Highness," came Impa's voice from the entrance.

"What is it?"

"A beehive. I don't know if any still live in there, though. Just leave it alone."

I took a step back, still watching the hive. "Of what is it made?"

She was quiet before answering, "I'm not sure. I've never really observed bees."

That surprised me. Impa had never failed to answer a question before. I turned to her, but she was sitting in front of the creepy stone again, staring it in the eye. A fish lay still behind her foot.

It won't beat Impa, I thought proudly. The thought fizzled out when Impa went corpse-pale.

"Impa?" I queried. My voice wouldn't shake in the face of fear—something learned from being royal so long. Speech stays strong in all circumstances.

"Zelda, stay here," she commanded, and I flinched. The first and last time she had talked to me that way had been last night. I stood immobile as she went to the entrance and disappeared with a CRACK.

The cave was very silent. For seconds I didn't dare to move, but slowly I took a step, and then another, toward the stone. It looked as unfazed as ever, and I hated it for it. Gathering my nerve, I glared it in the eye. No sooner had I noticed that there were no really signs that anyone had carved it into existence than I was thrown into color.

…a large plant with what looked like a head snapped its jaws futilely at the air…

…butterflies flitted around in the air over what seemed to be a labyrinth…

…another plantlike creature shot something at me from what seemed to still be the labyrinth…

…a forest community spread beneath me, and another plant monster strode from an entrance and planted itself several yards away from me…

_I want to see Impa,_ I thought angrily at the stone.

My hand hurt…

…a man in black armor stood in front of me, facing away. He was tall, with red hair and sun-browned skin…

…he stared at his hand, then looked up as a woman in silver ran to him, her eyes as steely as her armor…

…she ran at him, knives seeming to appear from nowhere, and she engaged him in silence. Her only sound was the whishing of her blades…

…the man laughed as they grappled, and knocked her away from him. She slid several yards away, much farther than I would have thought possible from such a weak looking blow. Before she could get to her feet, he came and stabbed at her calf with his sword, now drawn when she was felled. Her fist clenched in the dirt and her face went white, but she still made no sound even as he drew a knife as she was pinned to the ground. He aimed for her body with it, but she threw something to the ground and disappeared with a crack. It all happened in an instant…

A CRACK at the cave entrance shocked me out of contact with the stone, and I wheeled to see Impa sliding to the wall of our cave, her leg bleeding profusely. With a strangled cry, I moved from the stone, but a pain in my hand overwhelmed me. My throat worked, but I could make no sound, the pain was so intense. My vision was a whirlpool of colors as I tried to see through the water, but I could make out something bright, glistening gold on the back of my right hand.

"Farore give me courage," I heard dimly from above me. I struggled to focus on the voice, but black had been added to my mix of colors in profuse amounts. "…get out…here…you'll…safe…ld on…"


	3. Chapter 3: Mountains

I slid slowly back into consciousness. The ground beneath me was a far shot from the soft sand of my earlier location. It was solid, like the stone floor of my room. I sat up, expecting to see greys and reds and golds when I opened my eyes, but instead started when I saw expanses of rust brown beneath a blue sky.

My head swiveled sharply on my neck. I was in a cranny of rocks, also that reddish-brown color, hidden from anybody that would pass by, but yet I sat on a flat spot. Impa was nowhere to be seen.

"Hold still, princess," chided a soft, male voice. The tone was odd, for it sounded like whoever used it was speaking absentmindedly. I looked up, and met the large eyes of something huge, brown, and not human. I tried leaping to my feet, but I had a fleeting impression of meeting fabric instead of rock with my toes and then my face met what my foot missed. My eyes stung as my nose sent pain through my whole face, and I clasped my hand over it and tried not to cry.

"Hoo hoot! That is not holding still, princess," laughed the thing. I turned to it. The thing had not moved from its perch. The eyes were really not difficult to meet, since they took up most of its face. When I moved on from there, I saw feathers, folded wings, and taloned feet. A bird. An owl. I recognized it a bit late, but I had only seen illustrations in books of them, and I had no idea that owls were so…so _large_.

He tossed his head from side to side, sending the long, thin brown feathers on top of his head quivering and swaying like an odd imitation of hair, and then he twisted his head and looked at me upside down. I stared, wondering whether or not to be revolted. That wasn't natural, was it?

"Where is Impa?" I asked weakly. The head rotated again until it was properly oriented on his body.

"She went to get food and to find the people you will be staying with. I intercepted her here, and she asked me to watch over you." He cocked his head to the side. "I do hope she has you wear gloves, because I can't see any other way you're going to cover that up."

I frowned and looked at my hands. One was fine, but my right hand…

The sacred triangle, the Triforce, seemed tattooed to the back. But tattoos didn't glow. I held it closer to my face. The three triangles, their corners all touching, were bright golden yellow, with the inner triangle they formed shining like the white of an eye. My skin was almost as white as the center triangle, but the insignia still shouldn't have been so prominent. Could gloves really cover that? Something like that must have been put there by the goddesses…

I felt my pulse in my ears as the truth of that mental statement sank in. The Triforce was the symbol of the three goddesses of Hyrule: Din, Farore, and Nayru. Power, courage, and wisdom. And it was on my hand…

Why? Why would the insignia of the goddesses be on the back of my hand?

"Zelda." I turned around, and saw Impa with a…something, slung over her shoulder. It was a large, horse-sized, scaly green thing. Its belly was what part of the beast rested on her shoulder, and yet the tail brushed the hard dirt beneath her feet.

"What is that?"

"Breakfast." She dropped it on the ground, and its head dropping limply to the ground, with its neck doing nothing to support it, made me suddenly ill. The head was huge and triangular, and a set of huge, long, triangular, pointy teeth lined the inside of its mouth. It smelled like cooked meat, even though it seemed freshly dead. Its front half was plated in huge green armor, even slightly eclipsing its small, piggy eyes, but its tail seemed relatively unprotected. It only had two feet, just behind its short neck.

My face must have shown my disgust.

"It's a dodongo, and they're just fine to eat if you know how to kill them properly."

"I'm assuming you know how to kill it without letting it explode?" the owl asked dryly.

"Yes, but I doubt you would be able to manage it, Kaepora." She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, then took one of her larger knives and stabbed it under one of the large plates. The sound of knife in meat made my stomach roll. "You have to throw something sharp in their open mouth and puncture the organ that lets them breathe fire, or it swells and bursts."

"And how do you manage getting anything in its mouth?"

"You know how often they breathe fire. They have to take in a really big breath to do so, and they have to open the mouth really wide to get enough oxygen." She glanced again at our odd companion, but this time it seemed almost sly. "You've been overseeing our young lad for long enough. Didn't you know that it was a method similar that let him take down the old king dodongo?"

"If you expect me to go into any cave such as the dodongo's cavern, you are sorely mistaken, Sheikah."

The corners of her mouth twitched, and she went back to dismembering her kill. Amazingly enough, it was only when one of the plates came off and I saw the bloody muscle beneath when I finally got sick. Luckily, the amount of vomit was small, since I hadn't eaten since the day before…the day before. My stomach, fickle thing, rumbled.

"Now, Zelda," said Impa gently, walking less silently than usual to my side and wiping at my mouth and chin with a handkerchief. "It is meat like any of that you eat back at the palace. You knew that."

"I have never seen it," I replied bitterly. She smiled grimly.

"I am afraid, Highness, that you will be seeing much more of it. Where we are going…you do not get servants and butchers and chefs to do things for you." She left my side and limped back to her catch. "Do not look at it like a body, Zelda. It looks like raw meat, right? Look at it that way. Come here."

My belly still sinking, I reluctantly walked to her. She pressed the blade of her knife beneath another plate on its belly and sawed beneath.

"Try to cut it as close to the armor as possible. That way, we have more to cook and less to waste." She made her way down one side, then withdrew the knife and pressed the hilt into my hand. "Your turn."

"What?" I stared in horror at the body. "I cannot!"

"You can and you will," she told me firmly, as the owl hooted to himself and said, "My, she is a princess after all, isn't she?"

Swallowing past a warning, nauseous lump in my throat, I placed the blade so that the tip was under the plate on the other side of where Impa had worked. Steeling myself, I put pressure on the knife. It went in, but not even a quarter of the way up the blade. Dismayed, I pressed harder, forgetting my disgust, and the knife inched a little farther in. This was hard!

"Close to the armor, remember," Impa reminded me. Nodding, my tongue between my teeth, I set at separating soft flesh from the tough hide. I got halfway down the plate when Impa took the knife from me.

"That'll do," she said. Somehow, there seemed to be accomplishment in her voice as she finished my job. When the plate was off, she went about taking off the rest of the belly armor, and then slit open the abdomen and cleaned out the insides. Most of the stuff I recognized from my lessons (from illustrations, of course), but one, an organ with a small, palm-sized knife embedded in it to the hilt, was unfamiliar.

"What is that?"

"That is what enables a dodongo to breathe fire." She retrieved the small blade and wiped it on a grubbier cloth than the one she had earlier used on my face. "If it is still intact when the beast's heart ceases to beat, the dodongo will explode, and leave its slayer nothing but a scattering of ashes and a few burns besides."

"Why does it do that?"

"Well." She paused and considered. "If it dies prematurely, it will probably deal a lasting injury to whatever did it, and prevent it from killing more of its species."

"Then why would anything ever kill it?"

"Generally, nothing does. Occasionally the Gorons will, to use it to explode a part of the cavern and get to a choice section of rock ore, but they are usually left alone. They are the predators," she added, tapping one of the teeth with her finger. "Not the prey."

"Impa!" All three of us, attendant, princess, and owl, turned to the owner of the voice. It was a tanned youth, wearing shabby clothes, running toward us. When he reached us, he stood panting before bowing to—Impa?—and repeating, "Impa."

I was astounded that, for the first time in my life, Impa seemed to be of higher status than me. I didn't get the chance to be outraged, for the boy said breathily, "I will take you to the village, Lady Impa."

"My charge is to come with me," she said sternly. The boy nodded.

"Yes. Follow me. We do not wish to be found."

He turned and began walking, then looked back over his shoulder. Impa was still.

"I know how to get there. Perhaps you will bring us something with which we may wrap up our meat? It would be the second wasted kill in two days, otherwise."

He looked indignant, but then thawed and nodded before running off. Impa returned to preparing the dodongo meat.

"So are we near Goron City, then?"

"A bit north of that, yes," she replied absently. "It is unlikely that we will be found up here. Be thankful that we have journeyed to this place during the summer, for otherwise we would be trudging through snow. Later we will reach a desert—"

"Gerudo Valley?"

"No." She gave me an admonishing look before continuing, "We will reach my home, which is located near a desert other than Gerudo Valley. It is in close proximity to the mountains, and there is a spot where the two combine where my people live. We will still be in Hyrule, but barely."

She finished cutting up the meat in silence.

"Kaepora, will you accompany us?"

"Am I to tutor your young princess?" He up-ended his head again.

"Who else?"

The boy returned later, with an odd kind of cloth and a big shoulder-pack. Impa showed me how to wrap the meat in the cloth, and we both filled the bag. The last thing we added was the tail, with all of the spines removed.

"My lady Impa," the boy said reverently, "how did you manage to get dodongo meat?"

She smirked, but explained nothing. I rose to my feet and walked in the direction the boy had come from, but stopped when I heard no footsteps behind me. Looking back, I saw the boy trying to help Impa to her feet, and Impa doing her best to wave him off.

Her leg.

A new rush of hatred for Ganondorf engulfed me. He had wounded my attendant, after everything else he had done to us. To my people.

She managed to rise, and then limp over to me and put her hand on my shoulder.

"I am fine," she said softly. I wasn't reassured, and the flame in my body was far from extinguished.

The trip down the side of the mountain was slow-going, and not just due to Impa's injury. The only ones who seemed to have an easy time of moving were the boy and Kaepora. Our guide moved over the rocks and ledges like a goat, while we followed after like a pair of stumbling flatland horses. I felt like every step I took would send me sprawling, and I was all too aware of our altitude, for every time I looked to the side of the path there seemed to be double the normal amount of space. To my embarrassment, the boy offered aid to me more than he did to Impa, and she couldn't even walk right!

Finally, the ground leveled, and I had the courage to look up from my feet. They were bare, since the two Sheikah of the group had unanimously decided that my shoes were doing nothing for my balance. Unfortunately, now I had blisters.

"We're here," declared the boy.


	4. Chapter 4: Choice

The village where he brought us was very small—it looked about the same size as Kakariko, the village where Impa was housed. I almost believed it to be deserted at first glance, since there was none of the hustle and bustle that I was accustomed to seeing in a gathering of homes such as this. Then a man came from within one of the homes, and he looked over our small group.

"Impa," he acknowledged, with a bow. She inclined her head; I wondered if it was because she was of higher status than him, or because a bow would be too much for her in her condition.

"She is injured, headman," interceded the boy. "She has a wound through her calf that needs healer's attention."

"Then why don't you fetch our healer?" suggested the headman mildly. The boy nodded and went away. He looked to Impa again. "Are you here for sanctuary, Impa? Surely there is somewhere else to hide that would not have been such a trek."

"I am not worried for my safety," she replied. "She needs teaching, and skilled hiding."

The headman looked down at me. I felt flustered—my gown was ripped, torn, and stained with grass and dirt, and my feet were bare and my hair was falling gradually out of its headdress. I had to smell terrible too; it had been two or three days since I had last bathed.

"Ah," he breathed. He wasn't looking at my face. For some reason, looking at my hand seemed to trouble him greatly. "So…"

"Yes," she replied. "It must be true. Why else would it be on her hand?"

"But which…"

"It remains to be seen which. I know Ganondorf would choose that of Din, so it won't be her…" She hesitated. "The Door of Time closed over the boy. I do not know why that would have happened. If Ganondorf killed him…"

"What?" I pulled back from Impa. It couldn't be. "Link…"

The pair of Sheikah looked at me with pity. I shrank back. If Link was dead…

"The prophecy," I whispered. "Will it not be fulfilled?"

The two exchanged looks. "I think we should have a meeting," the headman said slowly. "We will discuss what has passed, and what will come."

I stood in silence as they left. I didn't care what they decided. If Link had been killed by Ganondorf…

There was no hope.

The boy found me a bit later. I sat on the grass, staring into nothing. He shook at my shoulder. I refused to respond.

"Impa wishes to speak to you," he said. When I didn't reply, he shook me again. "Hey." Hesitated. "Lady. Girl, c'mon, answer me!"

I looked up at him. My expression must have fazed him a bit, but not for very long.

"Lady Impa needs you," he repeated impatiently. "You must go, not moon about like a child—"

"I am not a child!" I snapped, standing right to my feet. He didn't falter, the insolent creature.

"Then don't act like one," he shot back. "Impa needs to talk to you _now_."

I glowered at him. Then I turned and stormed off, to look for my attendant.

"Zelda, here," Impa said gently, when I found her. She knelt in the middle of a grove of gossip stones. They seemed to be placed randomly about, but somehow being amongst so many made chills go up and down my spine even more than the one had before, in the cave. I sat where she indicated, right in front of her.

"Do you see the core stone?" she asked gently, but there was an underlying tone I did not recognize. I looked, and got a start when one of the stone eyes seemed to pin me to where I sat. "Look into it Highness."

How could I not? It had me pinned like a butterfly…

"Focus on who you want to see."

Who I want to see? He's dead…

"Focus, Highness…"

Sand came halfway up my vision, but I could see an expanse of sand that stretched for miles. Several rocks of incredible size seemed strewn about the sand lagoon, and a couple of shabby crows circled the air. Odd trees stood at angles in some places, but there weren't many. A bit to my left was a large, brown arch, formed by two tall stones holding up a horizontal third. The structure, random or natural, must have been almost three stories high. And under them…

My heart skipped a beat. Under them was a boy about my age, wearing green. Link!

He looked up at something that must have been facing away from me, because I could not tell what he was examining. He then looked around, and walked toward the small gathering of trees. He seemed to scratch his head for a moment, but then turned and looked right at me. He was far away, so I couldn't even distinguish his expression through the mist of airborne sand, but he went about closing the distance without hesitation.

Something green and slightly cone shaped burst from the sand behind him. I stared in horror as it advanced to him, but before it reached him he spun and cut it halfway through with his sword, then hit it again and finished it with a quick spin.

Had he always been that capable with his blade? He had seemed much more awkward when I had talked to him. Surely getting the Spiritual Stones hadn't changed him this much?

He finally reached me, and looked me right in the eye. His bearing had completely changed, no doubt about it. He carried himself with a surety that many adults I knew lacked. His eyes…I couldn't have named how they were different, but yet, they seemed…

Older?

He reached into his pack and pulled out a red and white mask, and put it to his face. The mask startled me—it had the same pattern on it that the stones did.

"Zelda, enough!"

I was pulled back into awareness of my body by Impa's insistent tug on me. I stared up at her bemusedly, until I remembered what I had seen.

"He is alive! Impa, Link is alive!"

"That he is," she said slowly. Her tone puzzled me.

"Impa?"

"I will speak of this at the meeting. We need to learn more."

"About Link?"

"Surely you noticed something different, Highness?"

"Well, yeah," I said. Was it bad?

"We will talk with the other Sheikah. If the lad is alive, then this changes plans."

Annoyingly enough, I was not allowed to go to the meeting. Never mind that I had gone to every single conference and meeting of my father's and behaved, but I was too young to be exposed to the advanced, covert, cryptic meeting.

I sat in a room by myself, and waited patiently. I did not know why I was being kept away from everybody else, but there must have been a reason for it. Like the reason I was not allowed to attend their stupid, childish meeting.

"Zelda, come with me," beckoned Impa, sticking her head in the doorway. I got up gladly, straightening my skirts, and followed her.

It appeared that the meeting was over, and Impa led me to another house, where a few Sheikah waited.

I found myself fitted for new clothes. I use the term loosely, for it was very unprofessional. They did not measure me or anything of the sort. They looked me over and took my dress off, and then they began throwing clothes over my head. The clothes I finally ended up in were baggy and shabby. They had tugged pants up over my hips and cinched them tight around my waist, despite my protests.

"You cannot dress like you did, Highness," said Impa. She unwove my headdress, and my star-corona gold hair fell to the back of my knees. "We must make sure that we are not found by Ganondorf or any of those in his employ or control. Even here, you might not be safe. You will dress like a Sheikah, and we will teach you our ways as Kaepora Gaebora teaches you the things you need to know as one of the Chosen. Even many of the villagers here will not be informed as to who you are. The ones who did work for the king and me will know even without us telling them, but nobody else. You must not tell people who you are. Do you understand?"

"What about the boy?" I demanded. "He knows who I am."

"He is getting this discussion as well."

I thought this over. "I understand, Impa."

"Good girl. Now, we are going to cut your hair—"

"What?"

"—and when you leave this village, you will be bandaged around your face. Nobody knows the Sheikah as well as they used to—we are a dwindling people. Your face is too pale to be completely Sheikah, but you inherited your ancestor's eyes—"

"Huh?"

"—your great great grandmother was a Sheikah, Zelda. That is why you are able to use the stones. That is why the royal family is attended by Sheikah. You are Sheikah, even if your blood is diluted." She met my gaze. I felt myself tremble—I was so overwhelmed…

"It will be fine, Zelda." She kissed my forehead. "You are strong, you will make it. It will be fine."

I nodded. I did not cry. I hadn't cried since I was a babe. Crying was weakness.

They used a knife to cut my hair. I was shorn like a sheep, close to my scalp. My blonde hair fell to the ground around my bare feet, brushing against my skin with feathery touches. I barely noticed. I was going numb.

Impa brought me a mirror of polished silver. My hair looked like it belonged to a boy. It was a dusting of blonde up until it reached the pointed tips of my ears, and then it reached an inch and two inches long. I had hair tickling at my eyebrows, and hair harassing my ears. My head felt too light.

"There, now," Impa crooned gently, brushing out what was left of my hair with the tips of her fingers. "That's not so bad."

"I look like a boy."

"And that is okay. The goddesses know who you are no matter how you're dressed or how your hair is cut, and the stones will recognize you. That is all that matters." She smiled weakly at me, and I thought I saw her lip tremble. "If this is the price for your survival, are you willing to pay it?"

I felt naked—people could see my legs, and I had less hair than my father had. But if it was this or be killed…

I nodded.

"We can call her Sheik," said one of the women. "It is a common, respectable name among our people." The rest voiced their agreement.

"What do you think?" asked Impa.

I nodded. I could be Sheik. I would survive and fight. If I could survive under Ganondorf's nose until I could help Link take him down…I would.

That was my choice.


	5. Chapter 5: Messing with Mamas

Clad in strange, immodest clothes, I was led to a nice house near the outskirts of the small village. Impa spoke consolingly to me on the way, but none of the words managed to actually slide into my ears. I was still numb—there was an odd breeze fingering my neck, and some loose hairs still clung tightly to my skin and begged me to scratch at them. I did not oblige.

Impa tucked me into bed. It was uncomfortable and itchy, and there was no pillow. Was this Sheikah tradition, or were we just poor? I was still writhing under the sheets, trying in vain to find a comfortable spot when Impa left. Irrationally I was angry with her, though I knew that without her, I would most likely be dead. As much as I loved the three goddesses, I had no intention of joining them yet, so I guilt-tripped myself into remaining grateful.

Somehow, while still carrying on in this vein, I glided into sleep.

I stood somewhere dark. The ground crunched beneath my shod feet, and yet something wet was seeping in through the leather. Glancing down, there were spiderwebs clinging to my calf-length leather boots, but they weren't strong enough to hold them to the black soil. The air was damp, and odd smells hit my nose. Rotting plant. I remembered the smell from when a blight had hit some of the flowers in the castle greenhouse, and many of the flowers in the warm, moist environment had started decomposing like wilting corpses.

A rustle above my head. Immediately back on the alert, my hands whisked themselves immediately to my back, my left grabbing a short sword, the right slithering expertly into straps on the back of a shield of tree bark. I looked up.

On the ceiling, clinging tightly to a bunch of root-looking rafters, was an eye. The biggest eye I had ever seen. Only when the reddish eye sailed down to my level and landed with a crash on its feet in front of me did I recognize the body—the body of an incredibly massive, spider-like creature.

I froze, but when she drew back and struck as a desert snake would, but with its whole body, I was flung backward. Mentally revived, I scrambled forward on my hands and knees through the cobwebs. When I rose to my feet, rubbing my shoulder with the back of my sword-wielding hand, I watched in horror as the arachnid plugged my entrance and exit with a series of nasty, thick webs that dwarfed the ones under my shoes.

It turned to me. Took several steps to me. Drew back.

A handle of something new was in my hand. I didn't remember dropping my shield or my sword, but suddenly, the moment it hit its highest altitude, poised for my death, I whipped the wooden handle above my head, glaring through a two-pronged piece of wood, and, in my other hand, released a pouch. The creature screeched and fell, large eye rolling like an agitated marble, before falling briefly still, a luminous bile green. I snatched my sword and struck it once, twice, thrice…

At the fifth blow, it recovered and pulled back, its eye bloodshot and narrowed with new analysis. When I advanced this time, it clambered up the wall and moved around on the ceiling. Eyes narrowed in the darkness, having lost my relative night-vision in the glow of its one eye, I watched it walk deliberately on the ceiling, and then drop something halfway to the ground. I stepped closer, hesitantly, as it undulated above me, and then I saw something drop to the ground, and then another. By the time the third had hit the ground, the first was making ominous cracking noises. My eyes flitted once to the ceiling, where Mama was resting and clutching, before I advanced on the egg. The other two I dispatched with a blow to each with my sword, but the last—the original—burst open before I got to it. A miniature of the creature above my head looked around and, much to quickly for its age, spun and leapt at me, stabbing at me with a stinger and striking home in my thigh. Falling to the webbed earth, I yelled as pain spread, and began swiping my sword back and forth until I felt it meet carapace and meat, and the thing fell off me and burned until it was still and decomposed.

Slowly I started getting up, but began moving much more hastily when I heard a large thud just beyond my toes. Mama was on her way. Blood pounded in my ears as I grabbed for my slingshot, and just like before I shot her in the eye and she toppled to the ground, her green eye going still until I slashed at it. She cried out every time the blade raked across her eye, and I could feel the weapon digging deeper and deeper into the tissue with every swing. As she had earlier, she recovered and stumbled to the wall, climbing drunkenly. Again I watched, ignoring the pain in my leg and shoulder, until she was in the position she had come to when she dropped her eggs to me. I waited at the bottom, ready to smash them, when I saw her eye, rolled back and a brilliant crimson, dropping bug blood to the ground before her eggs even left her. Resolutely I aimed my slingshot and shot her down. Crazed, she stayed still as I cut her and then stabbed to the hilt of my sword into the center. The hilt didn't meet resistance until it was at least halfway in, and she let out a pitiful moan as the light dulled and her body decomposed at the same rate and in the same way as her larva had.

The fight being over, I allowed myself to stumble, and saw her heart, purified somehow to a glimmering jewel-like object. I took it, and something zinged through my body, knitting the gash in my shoulder and healing the sting in my leg. Unfortunately, it did nothing for my exhaustion, and I glanced blearily around the room I was trapped in until I saw a blue glimmer in the center. There was something incredibly beautiful about the light, so bright in the middle of its ring that I couldn't even see the material beneath it, and couldn't discern its source.

Despite knowing nothing about it, I was drawn to it like a fairy to concentrated magic, and I had stepped in the center before I could consider anything otherwise. My body rose, and my feet left the ground, until all I saw was white.

Slowly I returned to consciousness, in my scratchy bed. For a moment I was disoriented, but then I came to hear voices, as if from far away. My immediate vicinity was silent. Sunlight on my bare wrist made the rest of my body feel cold, so I drew it from the glow of the outside world and tried to snuggle deeper into my bed. I was rewarded with a stab in the hip from something within the mattress, so I groaned and sat up. My skin was itchy still, and felt scaly. When I looked, I saw dry sweat on my spiderweb-pale arms.

With a rush, I remembered the dream. And, while it lacked in my sleep, recognition struck full force into my body, seeing the familiarity of the sword—short metal with a solid hilt of solidified Deku sap and an inset red gem in the pommel—and the shield—seemingly made of tree bark with the spiral design in a material I wasn't familiar with, the insignia mimicking the design of the Spiritual Stone of the Forest.

I had been Link.

But why?

Before any questions could be posed to my caretaker, who had been silently standing vigil in the kitchen, she had sat me down and presented me with some kind of meat that smelled odd and, upon entering my mouth, declared itself tough to chew. I gagged on it, and earned a hard look from Impa.

"What is this?" I asked with disgust after I had—somehow—swallowed the stuff.

"You should know—you helped prepare it." Impa was cleaning her fingernails with the tip of her dagger. When realization declared itself to me, I stared at the food in front of me.

"That dodongo thing?" I said, putting as much revulsion as I could into the three words.

"Yes." She glanced up at me under her silver eyelashes. "Eat up."

"A Goron wouldn't eat this," I grumped.

"Of course not. They eat only rocks."

I repressed a scowl; it wouldn't be ladylike. I wished I was like Link, with a fairy companion that I could commiserate with instead of strict Impa. Still cranky, I speared more of the meat and ate the rest of my food, but only after resuming my composure so I could do so with dignity, and not like a sniveling peasant child. At least, that was what my father had told me what sniveling would be like. I had tried it once, when I had been unhappy with where I was, and wanted to see if it would make me a peasant and I would be sent to the town. Instead, it got me spanked and sent to my room, where I was to stay until I could act my station.

After I finished, I sat still, waiting for Impa. When a few minutes passed without her doing anything, I cleared my throat. Her eyes raised to mine, and then they seemed to take in my situation. I was grateful.

"Well, pick it up," she prompted matter-of-factly. I stared at her. She looked at my plate, then back at me. "Pick it up and take it to the pile over there. I can wash it later with the rest of the dishes in the evening, with the other women."

I continued to stare at her, certain she wasn't serious. It wasn't until she looked back up at me and snapped a brusque "Now!" that I got up and stalked off with my plate like a whipped hound, taking the plate to the pile and placing it at the top. I winced as my worn feet complained at being used after such a beating as they got yesterday.

A knocking noise distracted me from my misery. I stared incredulously at the door, wondering what on earth had made it make such a sound, when Impa said in a bored tone, "Go answer the door, Sheik."

Sheik? I glared at her, unknowing of what I had done to warrant such treatment as I was getting that morning. Before she could bark at me again, I went to the door, not certain of exactly how she expected me to "answer" it.

It made the noise again. I hesitated.

"Open the door!" Impa ordered. Why didn't she just say so?

I did as she told, and the boy from yesterday stood on the doorstep, looking annoyed.

"You wanna play with us?" he demanded. I stood frozen in front of him, shocked at his abrupt tone. He rolled his eyes. "Are you stupid? Do you wanna come or not?"

I glanced entreatingly at Impa, but she was pointedly not looking at me.

"Impa?" I pleaded. She looked at the scene behind her chair, then returned to her fingernails.

"As long as she's back by sundown, Ralt."

Ralt nodded, looking resigned, and tugged at my sleeve. I started following, until a hand came down on my shoulder and handed me a pair of gloves. I put them on, and immediately the persistent hand tugged at my sleeve again, and I followed, bewildered, as he led me through the village until we reached a group of kids. They weren't all the same age—they varied from as young as six to as old as fifteen.

"This is Sheik," he introduced. "My mom says we have to play with him."

His choice in pronoun didn't even register as a couple of the younger kids grabbed at my hands and tugged me amongst them.

"We wanna play house!"

This announcement broke the dam and a river of children's yells followed.

"I wanna be the mommy!"

"I'm the baby!"

"No, I'm the baby!"

"You can be the daddy," a young girl, looking to be barely younger than I was, coolly informed me. "I'm your mommy."

What in Nayru's name were they talking about?

I found myself pulled into some intricate ritual of children announcing what they were doing. The only boy was a young one of about five that had been forced into being the brother by the same girl that had told me my odd role in the whole scheme. Several girls had announced that he was getting into trouble, he was punished, so he had to stand over there. Then it was announced that he and a young black haired girl had to go get milk from the cow, so they walked over to a girl that had to be my age, and she made mooing noises as they grasped at air under her stomach in odd, wringing gestures. I was directed to walk to one direction, then another, and then a young girl kissed my cheek. I drew back quickly at that, and got scolded for acting that way to my wife.

I glanced around, looking for some way to leave, and noticed Ralt and his older friends wander off. When the children were distracted by their "dog" I got up and followed them.

Thin yellow grass turned to red sand beneath my toes, and I finally caught up to the group. They laughed, still not noticing my approach, and trotted between a set of large, mountainous rocks that were striped with different shades of red and orange. I pursued them anxiously, and found they had disappeared. Panicking, I spun in my spot until I saw a gap in the rock to my left, and I entered.

It was dark, and I stepped carefully deeper into the rock. Sand shifted under my feet to let my foot contact more solid footing—more rock—as I crept farther in.

Something grabbed my arm. "Who are you?" a boy's voice demanded, breaking as it hit "are".

"Uh," I said, panicking. What was my name supposed to be again?

"Sheik?" Ralt's voice was surprised, but still irritated. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I followed," I provided, still trembling at the boy holding on to my arm.

"He's the new kid," Ralt explained. To me, he said, "Look, you can't just follow us, okay?"

"Why not?"

"Listen to him," sneered another. This one actually sounded female. "He sounds like such a girl." She pinched me, and I yelped. Why were they treating me like this?

"You're a girl," guffawed the boy with the funny voice. As my eyes adjusted to the dim lighting, I saw the girl punch him in the arm. I realized that he had released me.

As they seemed to forget I was there, my mind whirled around like a clockwork. They had said I acted like a girl. Called me "he" and "him". Did they think I was a boy?

Come to think of it, even Ralt had done that. He had seen me yesterday, though!

Was I supposed to be a boy? I didn't even know how to act like a boy!

The group continued to roughhouse, and then seemed to brush it off, laughing again. They started climbing deeper into the rock, and I followed mutely at the back of the pack. We started climbing upward, and still I went after, despite the scraping of my soles against the grainy rock, making my feet feel wet and sore. I must be bleeding, I realized dimly, still scrambling around on the rough surface. Near the top my foot slipped, and someone beneath me grabbed my hand before I fell too far.

"Careful, kid," grumbled a boy I hadn't heard yet. "Grab back on."

I followed his advice, and once my footing was sure again he released me.

"Just keep up and you can stick around, 'kay?" he said, and started climbing. I swallowed, recovering, and went to work at doing as he said.

Light broke suddenly, and I found myself in a hole in a very large, almost-flat-topped rock.

"Shit, what's that still doing here?" complained the girl that had pinched me. She sat, all her weight on her palms and butt, leaning back with her feet in front of her. She had silvery eyes, and her black hair braided tightly at the nape of her neck. She was built like Impa—scrawny looking, but all wiry muscle. In fact, everybody here seemed to look like that.

Everybody but me.

"Lookit how white he is," said a boy, reclining on an upward slope.

"His hair's pretty white too."

"Probably Hylian," dismissed the one that had startled me so badly earlier. True to form, his voice had cracked on the first syllable out of his mouth. He was taller than the others, and looked to be the oldest.

"Weren't you the one that led him here, Ralt?" asked the guy that caught me when I fell. He seemed older too—I'd probably place him at around fourteen or fifteen. He laid upside down on one of the red stripes in the rock, and it made it look like his head was bleeding.

Ralt looked flustered to me, and that was an aura that I was good at picking up. In court, be you young or not, discomfort is the first thing that gets smelled by the other wolves, cubs included. And among this group of self-assured older kids, his embarrassment was a red flag before he opened his mouth.

"He had to go play fetch for the two ladies," jeered the girl, leaning back against the guy with the voice, and he placed his hand on her shoulder as he guffawed again.

"Impa brought him," mumbled Ralt.

"And you brought Impa," remarked one of the smaller girls. She looked small enough to be a Kokiri, and just as pixielike. Had her hair not been black, I might have mistaken her for one, until I would have realized that she had no fairy. That, and she didn't seem to need green, with all the black she wore. "Therefore, you brought him. I think you can decide whether we keep him or not."

Keep me?

Ralt went pale. "Look, I didn't ask he-him to come along," he protested.

"Quit blustering like a baby," scoffed the first girl.

"Pyrrna, I—"

"Do you think he can do it?" She raised an eyebrow, and Ralt faltered.

"I could," I heard myself say. I immediately flushed under all the attention that got me. I had only meant to help Ralt, but with the amused looks I was getting, I wasn't sure I wanted to know what I had just unwittingly agreed to.

"Alright then," said Pyrrna, sitting up and looking at me. "You can stay with us if you can do the task we assign you. But no matter what, you can't rat us out, 'kay?"

I nodded hesitantly.

She grinned wolfishly. "Alrighty." She came up to me and leaned close to my ear, her hand on my shoulder. "We'll go up to the mountains, and you can steal us a Wolfos pup." She turned to Ralt. "You think he could do that?"

He bit his lip. I expected him to say no, I couldn't, but instead he said with resignation, "I guess so."

Getting to the mountains was a long walk, though not as long as I would have thought. Even so, my feet were complaining as they ascended the somewhat grassy slopes, but even that respite died out after a bit. I wasn't exactly sure what a Wolfos was, but I was pretty sure I was about to find out.

"We are arming him, right?" I heard Ralt ask Pyrrna.

"Yeah, we'll give him a dagger." She glanced back at me. "He's not very old, is he?"

"No, he's not." Ralt seemed angry with her for just that reason. "Do we really have to do this?"

"I wanna see if he can." Her tone was dismissing, but I had a feeling it lied deeper than that. She wanted to see if the scrawny Hylian boy could get what she wanted.

Well, I'd try, if only to say, "So there" if I succeeded.

Even if not exactly to her face.

A couple of times I faltered, and one of the other kids would give me a helpful push forward. I wondered if this was because the guy earlier had told them, if it was because they wanted to see me do well, or maybe just to see the little kid get eaten by some monster.

I hoped to the three goddesses that it was not the latter.

"Found her," Pyrrna breathed. We were on the side of the mountain, and she had found a small hole. I stared at it. What on earth was so fearsome that it stayed in a hole that tiny?

"Look," she instructed, stepping back. I gave her a cursory glance before leaning forward and looking.

A large grey wolf was lying on her stomach, head resting on her forepaws. Her lips, even in sleep, were raised to bare overlarge teeth.

Resolutely, I started digging at the hole with my fingers, and soil started coming away from the entrance to the cave. I saw her ear twitch, and I paused until I was certain that she hadn't woken up. Before I finished digging, Pyrrna tapped my shoulder and handed me a knife, hilt first. Finally, the hole was wide enough for me to slip through until my feet were planted firmly in the center of her den.

A sort of confidence came over me, and I swaggered up to the wolf. On the other side of her was a bunch of grey, tufty-furred fuzzy puppies, just at that stage where our master of hounds would have them weaned. I stepped carefully around the tail and reached out my hand for a puppy.

The mother moved before I could even really register the motion, until I got a good look at teeth and yellowed eyes. I leapt backward, then ducked as a massive forepaw swung at me, raking the earth out of the wall. The puppies made mewling noises, stumbling awkwardly around the cave as their mother howled and snarled. The dagger, though in my hand still, was forgotten, and I ducked as blow after blow was swung, intended to decapitate me. My eyes flicked around for an escape, and instead fell on the pups. An idea clicked into place in the crazier half of my brain and I dove for one, just under another wild swing from their mother. Wolfos were obviously not very smart. I felt fuzz on my arm and weight in my gloved hand, and I wheeled and made the puppy visible. The mother stopped, snarling, as I showed her the hostage. It surprised me that it never occurred to her to use her teeth.

Hesitantly, I stepped back, and she growled, but did not attack. I just hoped she didn't decide to kill me despite the puppy in my hands. I made eye contact with her and held it as I continued to retreat. The puppy squirmed between my hands, but I did not release it. It wasn't until I reached the hole that I realized I had another problem. There was no safe way of getting through the hole without hurting the puppy.

"Sheik, just leave the puppy," whispered one of the kids behind me. I had no idea which, and at that point, I didn't really care.

"I can't," I said. "Dig me out."

Dirt shifted behind me. The whole time I kept eye contact with Mama wolf, resolutely holding the pup to my chest, in plain view but close to me.

"Okay, climb back out."

I stepped back, my foot feeling softer dirt. Blood rushed in my ears and I could swear I could feel my pulse in my neck, but I still held her gaze as I backed out of her den.

It wasn't until we were halfway down the slope when Pyrrna clapped me on the back.

"Good work. Give the pup to me, now."

"It's okay, I've got it," I said, shifting the small Wolfos to a better position that would be more comfortable for both of us.

"Kid, we've gotta get rid of it," said the oldest, peering around Pyrrna. "Give it to us so we can take care of it."

I slowed and stared at them suspiciously. "You wanna kill it?" I asked, my voice going cold.

"It's a Wolfos," said Pyrrna, stopping. "Give it to us."

"No." I was angry now, and I didn't yell when I was mad. Yelling when I was angry never got me anywhere—it was when I sounded stronger and clearer when people listened to me. "I went through all that to get it, and you're not killing it after it's just been separated from its mother."

"Just give us the damned pup," snarled the guy, and he walked toward me, but Ralt and the guy who helped me stepped between us.

"He stole it," said the latter, his tone deliberate. "If you wanna choose what you do with a Wolfos pup, get it yourself. He's more than earned leave to do what he wants."

"He didn't even kill the Wolfos!" Pyrrna squalled, rage lighting her eyes.

"You didn't tell her to," Ralt stated.

"That would only have made them suffer, anyway," I growled, my eyes staying on Pyrrna. "All creatures are revered in the eyes of Farore, their passions in Din's, and their thoughts in Nayru's. To needlessly kill is sin."

Be they Wolfos or Hylians.

"Touch him and you'll regret it, Garren," hissed my older protector. Ralt seemed to convey the same message without words, even though he was younger than both of the other boys.

The group stayed absolutely still for a bit, until a portion stepped back, including Pyrrna and Garren. They left, and the rest of us stayed in silence for a moment longer.

"Looks like you've got something to look after," said Ralt, finally. He smirked at me. "You earned it."


End file.
